Reporter and farmer. [volume] (Webster, Day County, Dakota [S.D.]) 188?-1946, 1887-03-24
AN EVENTFUL NIGHT.
Row II, 200 Veterans Rsioiced When the End
Came-yfadness Of joy Unspesksbls.
nr-.LEs. a..Ahn Trihnnn ---.-.--ML- ~

Hoy IL. 900 Veterans Rsiolced when the End
Came-Hadness Of joy Unspesksbls.
Written for the Tribune.
1.-THE years of q lifetime are too few
TO eface from memory q scene N
which I was an active participant
night more than twenty years ago in
the wilds OF East Tennessee" The
speaker was an old volunteer officer
who served through the warm an Ohio
regiment. He had seen a great deal OF
war in all it's phases, and had been
once severely wounded. At this time
he was one OF small company OF
friends who were talking OF those STIR
ring events. Being pressed to tell the
story of the night in question he con-
tinued:
az belonged to the old Fourth
corps, army ofthe Cumberland. When
Uncle Billy Sherman laid Atlanta in
ashes and pulled out with five corps
for Savannah, he sent back the Fourth
and Twenty-third, under old Pap
Thomas, you remember, to take care
of Hood. who, by a wide detour to
the north and rest, had turned up on
the Tennessee river and was threaten
ing Nashville. The repulse of Hood
at franklin, followed, two weeks
later, by the magnificent victory Of
Thomas at Nashville, almost Destroy
ed the confederate army. From the
day those demoralized remnants re-
crossed the river we never again look
ed into the muzzle of their muskets.
/ have said all this SO that you may
understand how it happened that we
were away up among the mountains
of East Tennessee.
c"Late one evening there came to us
news that threw the camps of the va
rious brigades and divisions into the
widest uproar. No language OF mine
can convey more than a faint con-
ception of the reality. Nobody ever
saw or heard anything Xix, it before
nor, probably, ever will again. l
suppose you want to know what 1T
was all about. 1t was near the middle
OF April. Darkness had settled down
over the great bivouac. The bugles
had sounded the tattoo. The grizzled
veterans who had been squatting
around the camp-fires, talking over
the scenes of the past and wondering
when the war would be OVERHEAD
knocked the ashes from their pipes
| and crawled within their little pup
tents, or their shelters made of boughs.
All was still, save the measured tread
of the sentinels as they passed to and
fro upon their beats around the sleep
ing army.
"Suddenly then came rafting
through the clear night air a sound
that aroused every soldier in an in
slant. We had often herd it before,
and it always meant business.
1t was the long roll at division
headquarters. And such long roll
as it wasl The drummer handled his
sticks as if he were pounding for his
yerylife. When a soldier hears the long
roll he never waits for orders. 1t is an
alarm that has but one meaning. His
duty is to get his traps on and take
his place in line, and to be very lively
about it, too. The drums at the
headquarters of each brigade took up
the sound and the piercing blasts ofbu-
giles joined in the chorus. Started from
their sleep the soldiers kicked off their
blankets and it wasn't a minute till the
companies were formed, every man
with his accoutrements buckled
on and his musket at a shoulder
in response to the Fall mf'
OF the orderly ~sergeants. Again
drums and bugles sounded, the COM
nanies marched to the color line and
the regiments were ready for action.
1t was a moonless night and the dark
ness of the oak woods was but feebly
dispelled here and there by the flicker
ing light of the smouldering fires.
Everybody inquired of everybody
else what the matter was. We had
not supposed there vas any consid-
cradle force OF the enemy within a
hundred miles OF us. But such
alarms had always betokened some
great emergency and the soldiers
thought of nothing but a night attack
upon the camp. Every ear was strained
to catch the rattle of shots on the
picket-line. No sound was heard
save the hustle OF the assembling
troops and the voices of the officers as
they gave the necessary command. 1t
was one OF GEose moments of anxious
suspense that test the courage of the
bravest veteran.
IAN orderly from brigade headquar-
tiers dashed up and handed a paperto
the colonel of our regiment. "a bit of
candle was found, and by it's sputter-
ing light the colonel glanced at the
message. Jumping about four feet in
the air he gave one wild, piercing yell,
that an Apache chief might strive in
vain to rival, We all thought for the
moment that he had gone crazy.
When he came down he handed the
paper to the a~djutant, letting off an
other yell, and told him to read
it to the regiment. 1t was a copy
OF a telegram from Secretary Stanton,
announcing the surrender of Lees
army. The scene that followed no
words can adequately describe. The
colonel and adiuntant swung their
hats and danced around and fairly
howled. Every officer and soldier in
the regiment, and in every other regi-
ment, did the same thing. We had
heard shouting and yelling before, and
had done our full share of it on occa-
sion, but never anything like that
which greeted the reading of this dis
patch. From one end of the camp to
the other the confusion and uproar
were prodigious. Men laughed and
danced and Rugged one another, and
rent the air with every kind of noise
possible to the human voice, pitched
in its highest key. 1t was as if the
inmates of a score of lunatic asylums
had been turned loose in those Ten
nessee woods. r. -EE
when the yelling had in some de-
gree subsidized, from sheer vocal ex-
haustion, the soldiers began to cast
about for other means to make a
noise. 1t didn't matter what it was
the more diseordant the better, only
so that it helped to swell the awful
din. Meanwhile, all the brass bands
were playing-though nobody could
tell what the tunes were-the shrek of
flies and rattle of drums were heard
on every hand and the buglers strain
ed to make themselves heard until it
seemed as if they would blow their
heads of. Then the artillery opened.
Gun after gun Joined in the mighty
chorus until every battery in the corps
was sending forth its thunders to echo
among the mountains. Regiment after
regiment began to fire their muskets.